Azure Edge

by Leaf Blade


78. Old Sparring Buddy

“How’s it going, space cadet?” Rainbow tapped Rarity on the arm, rolling her eyes at the girl staring vacantly off into space after AJ and Pinkie left. Plus, teasing Rarity helped Rainbow ignore the feeling of loneliness that she definitely wasn’t feeling, and even if she was, it definitely wasn’t because Applejack was gone!

Rainbow wasn’t like some puppy with separation anxiety who gets nervous and sad the moment her mast—uh, girlfriend is gone.

“Rarity?” Rainbow tapped Rarity again, and only this time did Rarity respond with a blink and confused muttering. “Earth to Rarity? You in there?”

“Uh, yes,” Rarity cleared her throat. “Sorry, darling! Got a little sidetracked!”

“It’s fine,” Rainbow shrugged, but soon found that she was the one staring into space now, or at least at the empty train tracks that Applejack’s train had departed down.

“Everything alright, darling?”

“What? Yeah,” Rainbow sputtered, shaking off Rarity’s concern with a nervous laugh. “Everything’s—” Rainbow bit her lip, but she stopped herself before she drew blood this time. “Do you think she’ll be alright? With her family, I mean?”

“I think so,” Rarity said firmly, and for a sec Rarity’s confidence made Rainbow feel like things were gonna be okay, “but even if she has a dreadful trip, she knows that she has a wonderful family waiting for her when she comes home.”

Rainbow looked at Rarity, who was smiling brightly, but had to quickly turn her back on Rarity to hide the tears welling up in her eyes. Did Applejack consider Rainbow to be… family? That was a nice thought, but they hadn’t been doing stuff together for that long, had they?

“You really think—” Rainbow said, trying not to let her voice crack. “You really think Applejack— thinks of— us, as family?”

“Knowing that girl,” Rarity chuckled, “yes. She definitely thinks of you as her family.”

Agh, now why’d you have to go and say that?

Rainbow’s face twisted up as she tried her absolute best not to get all misty-eyed, and she was really glad that the Moon District station was as empty as ever. She wiped her eyes and, with a loud sniffle, managed to get herself under control.

“Alright, I gotta go,” Rainbow said as she spun around to face Rarity.

“Right now?” Rarity cocked her head. “That was awfully sudden.”

“Yeah I know,” Rainbow grumbled, “but I gotta go to Hunter’s Haven. You’ve been doing pretty great at keeping up with your missions and everything, but ever since me and Applejack, uh, started… doing things together—”

“You can say ‘dating’, sweetheart,” Rarity giggled.

“Right, like I said,” Rainbow cleared her throat, her cheeks feeling like someone had left the oven on inside them for like a year, “doing things together. Uh, ever since that, I’m pretty sure I’ve only been on that fruit bat mission with you, and like no others.”

“That was a fun one though,” Rarity chuckled.

“It was pretty great,” Rainbow rolled her eyes as she fondly recalled that absolute mess of a mission. “Anyway, I also gotta think up a nickname for Applejack.”

“Do you need help?”

“Nah,” Rainbow held up her hand and shook her head. “I think it should be something I come up with on my own. I just don’t wanna come up with something dumb, y’know?”

“Whatever you decide on,” Rarity said, putting her hands on Rainbow’s shoulders, “it will be marvelous, because it will be something that comes from your heart. And Applejack will be sure to love it, because she loves you.”

“Right,” Rainbow felt her face heating up again and she brushed off Rarity’s hands, “you say that, but—”

Rainbow cleared her throat which spun into a hacking cough, and then she shook herself awake a little bit. It was pretty early for her to be up, but she wasn’t going to miss Applejack before she left.

“Anyway,” Rainbow said, “I’m gonna bounce.”

“I’ll see you later,” Rarity said. “I’ll probably be at the library for a while, if you need me.”

“’kay,” Rainbow nodded and clapped Rarity’s hand, “see ya around.”

Rainbow didn’t need to wait for the train to get to the Sun District since she could just fly there, so after saying goodbye to Rarity, she let loose her wings and headed straight there. It only took a couple minutes to reach her destination, but every second of those minutes was spent thinking about Applejack.

It’d already been like a few weeks, and Rainbow still couldn’t believe she was actually dating Applejack.

It was super surreal, this girl she’d been crushing on for months, which felt like an eternity, was now saying that she loved Rainbow and kissing her, and damn could she kiss. It was a lot to process, and Rainbow didn’t feel like she’d ever get used to it, but for now she could just be happy that it was real.

She at least had one thing in her life that was really worth looking forward to. A reason not to be so reckless, at least for now.

The lively atmosphere of Hunter’s Haven was a welcome distraction to Rainbow’s racing thoughts. The foyer was absolutely full to bursting with Slayers accepting missions or bragging about their latest kills or just shooting the breeze. It was almost nice, if not for the constant reminder that Rainbow didn’t fit in here.

Ever since Rainbow’s first day as a Slayer, even since her days in the academy, the other hunters had given her grief; she was too short, she was too noisy, she was too brash, she was too stubborn, and on and on.

And maybe it hurt Rainbow at first, that nopony liked her or wanted to be friends with her, but nowadays it was just more motivation for her to become the greatest Slayer in the world, to show all these clowns just who they’d been messing with this whole time.

Rainbow trotted confidently through the room to the reception desk to assign herself a mission, simultaneously annoyed and relieved that nopony was paying attention to her, but then she stopped in her tracks when she heard a familiar raspy voice call out her name.

“Hey, Rainbow Dash! Long time no see!”

Rainbow turned around and, sure enough, saw a golden yellow pegasus with a fiery orange mane walking toward her, clad in an azure blue uniform with a clashing red scarf.

“Spitfire,” Rainbow muttered to herself, more than a little caught off-guard that she was even here.

“Hey, how’s my favorite old sparring buddy?” Spitfire said jovially, putting her arm around Rainbow and ruffling her mane.

“That’s a funny way to say ‘girl I’ve barely seen in like a bazillion years’,” Rainbow shot back teasingly, giving Spitfire a playful shove.

“Hey! I’ve seen you plenty of times since I started working under Celestia,” Spitfire harrumphed, “not my fault you turned her down,” and the coldness in Spitfire’s tone took Rainbow by surprise, but she didn’t want to question it.

“Yeah, I guess I was at your graduation,” Rainbow smirked, “though I was kinda out of it that day. While you were getting pampered by Celestia’s maids or whatever, I was single-handedly dealing with a pack of timberwolves.”

“That’s funny,” Spitfire teased back, “I wouldn’t call ‘helping defend Luna Bay from an onslaught of ghouls’ being ‘pampered’.”

“Oh pfft,” Rainbow scoffed, “you’re just trying to one-up me!”

“Don’t make it so easy for me then.”

Spitfire grinned, and Rainbow growled at her, a jolt of electricity charging through the air between the two. Though it was quickly discharged when Spitfire laughed, and Rainbow found herself softening up as well. She still had a long way to go to catch up to Spitfire, but she was glad her rival was someone so kind and easy to look up to.

“It’s honestly great to see you, Rainbow Dash,” Spitfire held out her hand, and Rainbow shook it gladly. “And I hope you’re not feeling too overshadowed.”

“By you?” Rainbow scoffed. “You may have a lead now, but I promised you when you became Celestia’s student that I wouldn’t let you beat me, and I keep my promises. I’m gonna leave you in the dust, Spitfire.”

“I like your confidence!” Spitfire beamed. “But that wasn’t what I was talking about. I mean, your new partner is Celestia’s star pupil. You gotta feel weird about that, right?”

“Why?” Rainbow shrugged. “Celestia and Rarity aren’t the same pony, and just cuz I didn’t want Celestia’s help, doesn’t mean I can’t accept Rarity’s.”

“Still though,” Spitfire said seriously, “you turned Celestia down cuz you said you wanted to become the strongest Slayer in the world on your own, with your own power. Do you honestly think anyone’s gonna take your power seriously when you’re with her?

“Do you honestly think those people you saved from those quarray eels, or that cragadile, or even those fruit bats, do you think they saw you? Or do you think they tell their friends about how Celestia’s student saved them and their town?”

Rainbow was silent.

She didn’t know what to say.

Celestia offered to train Rainbow Dash when she was just a kid, and not a day went by after turning her down that Rainbow didn’t wonder if she made a horrible mistake that day. At least not until…



“You’re the girl who turned Celestia down, right?” Rarity had said, slamming her hands on Rainbow’s table.

“Yeah?” Rainbow scoffed irritably. “What of it?”

“You must be so strong!” Rarity said with a gleaming smile. “I want you to be my partner!”



It was because of that decision that she met Rarity, and meeting Rarity was the only thing in her life that had ever gone right. How could she regret it?

But still…

“What are your long-term goals, Rainbow?” Spitfire said, snapping Rainbow out of her thoughts. “Do you have any?”

“I wanna be the strongest Slayer in the world,” Rainbow replied confidently, clenching her fists. “I wanna show everypony how strong I am, so that no one has to be afraid anymore!”

“And how are you going to do that?” Spitfire asked skeptically. “You can’t be a symbol of hope and peace if nopony knows who you are. And as long as people view you as the right-hand gal of Celestia’s star student, how can you hope to be anything more than that?”

Rainbow didn’t have time to answer that question, or even really process it, before a frantic looking pegasus interrupted their conversation.

“Captain Spitfire! Lady Rainbow Dash!”

If a grunt worker was referring to Rainbow Dash with an honorific, then whatever news she had must be serious, and it probably also meant that she’d have to get Rarity.

“An urgent mission has appeared and you two have been summoned to Haven’s Hold!” the desperate pegasus said, Rainbow and Spitfire’s ears both shooting up in alarm. “And Lady Rainbow Dash, you need to col—”

“Get Rarity?” Rainbow asked gruffly, and rolled her eyes at the pegasus’ shaky nod.

“Of course, get Rarity,” Spitfire muttered, “she is Celestia’s star pupil, after all.”

“Right,” Rainbow sighed. Why would they just need me¸ after all? When I’m a nopony.

“So what’s the mission, soldier?” Spitfire asked the shaky pegasus. “If we’re being summoned to Haven’s Hold, it must be A-Class.”

The pegasus took a deep breath to steady her nerves, and Rainbow figured she must not have been working for the Slayers for very long. This was probably the first time she’d been asked to summon anypony for an A-Class mission, and Rainbow couldn’t really fault her for being nervous.

But nothing could’ve prepared Rainbow for what actually came out of the woman’s mouth.

“Captain,” she said, “it’s a dragon.”